Friday, February 28, 2014

Good Calories. Bad Calories:

This book starts with the idea that much of what the public is taught about healthy eating is the product of bad science. Not that the test done on diet were all that bad (although do to the inability of doing double blind test on what people eat there are limitations to using normal scientific protocols in the tests.) But that people have consistently interpreted the results of tests to fit their hypothesis/the current ideas on food. (Some he argues do to blindness, some to save face, some to save their job, and some because the test wasn't even testing what they thought it was. He also goes into detail on why they did this.) To argue this point he deals with the actual raw data relating to diet from the last century. This makes this book very dense reading with a lot of footnotes, bibliography entries, and a large index. They author's main point is that carbs and especially the highly processed carbs of the modern diet are the reason that people in Western and Westernized countries are getting fatter and dealing with weight related health problems like heart problems and diabetes. Because there are not large number of large scale studies that have looked at the possibility that a low-carb diet can help one lose weight or improve health or that compare the low-fat, low calorie diet with a low-carb one (At least not when this was written) when he deals with proving why he thinks this he has to use more individual cases and observations. But, after dealing with the problems in the use of low-fat, calorie reducing diets, his theory comes across as something that at least looks promising.

Note to friends: Yes, I have lost weight, twice the amount that I ever lost on a traditional diet, also I am not hungry, and I'm only working out because I have more energy now. :)